In the course of time it has become clear that policy analysts who use traditional formal modeling techniques have limited impact on policy making regarding complex policy problems. These kinds of problems require the analyst to combine scienti®c insights with subjective knowledge resources and to improve communication between the parties involved in the policy problem. A policy analyst who tak...

Introduction Participatory or deliberative research is increasingly popular in social science and policy circles (Rowe and Frewer 2004, 2005). Although not explicitly stated, there seems to be an assumption that methodological approaches which incorporate participatory values bring tangible epistemological gains. In this paper we question this assumption and ask if the benefits of deliberative ...

This paper presents experiences from a user-driven innovation process of an outpatient department in a hospital. The mixing of methods from user-driven innovation and participatory design contributed to develop an innovative concept of the spatial and organizational design of an outpatient department in a hospital. Design games and tabletop simulation seem to be powerful tools in facilitating s...

The need to understand what might constitute best practice in participatory methods for resource management is becoming ever more important as the requirement for a high level of participation becomes prescribed in the environmental directives of the EU and elsewhere. Since there are numerous potential stakeholders who may participate, various different goals of participation and many potential...

This review outlines the benefits of using multiple approaches to improve model design and facilitate multidisciplinary research into infectious diseases, as well as showing and proposing practical examples of effective integration. It looks particularly at the benefits of using participatory research in conjunction with traditional modelling methods to potentially improve disease research, con...

The budget is the key means for effecting policy in democracies, yet its preparation is typically an opaque and arcane process. Participatory budgeting is making inroads in municipalities, but is usually limited to a small fraction of the total budget as its methods do not scale: They cannot handle quantitative budget items nor hierarchical budget construction. Here we apply the Condorcet princ...

In light of growing concerns regarding the ongoing drug war in Thailand and a lack of support for people who inject drugs in this setting, in 2008, we undertook a community-based participatory research project involving a community of active drug users at a peer-run drop-in center in Bangkok. This case study describes a unique research partnership developed between academic and active drug user...

BACKGROUND Ethically sound research in applied ethnobiology should benefit local communities by giving them full access to research processes and results. Participatory research may ensure such access, but there has been little discussion on methodological details of participatory approaches in ethnobiological research. This paper presents and discusses the research processes and methods develo...

BACKGROUND Few large and rigorous evaluations of participatory interventions systematically describe their context and implementation, or attempt to explain the mechanisms behind their impact. This study reports process evaluation data from the Ekjut cluster-randomised controlled trial of a participatory learning and action cycle with women's groups to improve maternal and newborn health outcom...

Participatory budgeting enables the allocation of public funds by collecting and aggregating individual preferences; it has already had a sizable real-world impact. But making the most of this new paradigm requires a rethinking of some of the basics of computational social choice, including the very way in which individuals express their preferences. We analytically compare four preference elic...